Researchers from Yale University and Harvard University have shown that they can use morpholinos to protect a microRNA target gene from suppression in order to evaluate specific miRNA-mRNA interactions in zebrafish.

“Thousands of miRNA-mRNA interactions have been predicted, but less than a dozen have been shown to have an in vivo function,” according to the researchers, whose study appeared in Science. “The sequence selectivity of … target protectors makes them excellent agents to disrupt specific miRNA-mRNA interactions.”